The politics of performance: methodological challenges of researching children’s experiences of childhood through the lens of participatory video

This paper examines the value of participatory video (PV) for exploring childhood and children’s experiences within the context of a larger research project which sought to examine the everyday lives of residents in a neighbourhood identified as ‘disadvantaged’. Participatory methods are often premised on ameliorating the gap between the concepts and models of researchers and those of individuals and communities. However, within PV, there has been much less focus on the process of participation and its implications for research outcomes. This paper addresses this gap in order to explore how the children, researchers and residents co‐produced a visual narrative about life in the neighbourhood, and in particular, how a methodological focus on PV as process makes visible its potential to offer valuable insights not only into children’s social connectivities, relationships and friendships but also into the theorising of children’s identities and childhoods.